Biography

Colm Meaney is the kind of actor who can easily lose himself in the role of an "Everyman", a hardnosed government agent or a psychotic madman with equal ease. Born and raised in Dublin, Ireland with his three brothers and raised by strict Roman Catholic parents, he entered…more

On February 28, 2009, Colm Meaney attended a fund raiser for The Greater Philadelphia Film Office, an organization which is dedicated to bringing film projects to the area. In attendance were many of the main cast and crew of the film Law Abiding Citizen, including actors Jamie Foxx, Gerard Butler, Michael Irby, Bruce McGill, Leslie Bibb, director F. Gary Gray and producers Lucas Foster and Alan Siegel.

In 2008, Colm Meaney's image was used on a 55c denomination stamp in Ireland. The picture used was from his role in "Kings", a film directed by Tom Collins and based on the play "Kings of the Kilburn Highroad" by Jimmy Murphy. "Kings" is a 2007 film featuring both the Irish and English languages and was Ireland's official entry for Best Foreign-language Film in the 2008 Academy Awards.

Colm Meaney had been cast in the role of "Lt. Gene Hunt" in the American version of the television series "Life on Mars" and had even shot the pilot episode, but was later replaced by Harvey Keitel. The pilot was reshot with Keitel in the role.

In the 1970s, he performed with the leftist 7:84 Theater Company, a troupe presenting plays for "working-class audiences", dealing with "political, social and cultural issues of inequality, prejudice and oppression."

Quotes

Colm Meaney: (about the episode of The Simpsons he voice worked in) Yeah I was, I thought it was very funny and I thought they understood the Celtic Tiger thing, I mean it was just coming to the end of it, but I thought it was funny that no one goes to the pub any more, they are all working. I just thought it was a funny take on things.

Colm Meaney: (On the Star Trek francise reboot) I just caught it on a plane and it looked great to me. It was beautifully shot, they had obviously spared no expense on the effects and all of that, it looked great. And I think the performances were terrific and it seemed very exciting.

Colm Meaney: (On his fans) There was the STAR TREK audience who knew me for that work exclusively and then there were people who knew me from the films I had made, particularly the independent and European films, who were almost unaware that I had even done STAR TREK. So it was kind of nice because it was like I had two separate careers.

Colm Meaney: If I did want to direct I'd want to do a feature and I really don't think I have the temperament for it. You've got to concentrate on one project for two years of your life. I'm not a long distance runner, I'm a sprinter! I think I can be useful in terms of producing and helping to get something up and running. There's so many good directors out there, why does every actor want to direct?

Colm Meaney: (On Irish-Americans and their views of Ireland) A lot of them don't want to hear anything negative or hear of any problems in Ireland. They don't want to hear about stuff like that. They have this romanticised idea in their head and they want that to be confirmed.

Colm Meaney: (On leaving Ireland to continue his career) My leaving was through choice - I didn't really have to go. I have to say, I was in London in the 1970s and I bumped into a lot of guys like these and, to my shame, I wasn't very sympathetic. I always felt like, 'Look, I can go home any time. Why are you sitting here crying in your pint about the old country? If you want to go, the boat and train are there - go and you'll be home in the morning.' Without really understanding what was going on.

Colm Meaney: (On Trekkies) It's funny; they've always been so polite. They're the only people who ever called me Mr. Meaney. They just wanna let you know what they think, or that they love the show or whatever and it's "thank you very much for listening to me and goodbye"!

Colm Meaney: (With what he brought to his role in "Three and Out") With good writing I always compare it to good music, ya know? It's there on the page already. Like I say, it was a very well written well observed character so I just had to play the notes.

Colm Meaney: It's almost like I'm two different actors. Most people in the business, in the feature film business--directors, producers--they don't even know I did Trek. Which is good, in a way, because the danger in doing something like Star Trek is that you end up in that pigeonhole and you're doing that the rest of your life.

Colm Meaney: I avoid those Star Trek conventions as much as I can. I didn't do them at all when I was doing the show. But I've done about four or five since. Talking about the show reminds you of things that you went through. So it's fun. When the show was on, I couldn't have handled it. I didn't want that direct connection.

Colm Meaney: You don't want to be just playing one character for the rest of your life, and I told that to [producer] Rick Berman. And he said he would always get me out to do a feature I really wanted to do. And for seven years he was true to his word. It was amazing.

They'd write me out of a couple of episodes or they'd maybe shoot two days back-to-back-the last day of one episode and the first day of another episode-which would cut me loose for two or three weeks. It was kind of a scheduling nightmare, but it was well worth doing. And I'll always be grateful to Rick for that, because for seven years he really made that work.

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